A blog about food, focusing on vegan cooking for one person (or two small eaters).

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Monday, July 18, 2016

Radical Rangoons for One

This little recipe is usually an appetizer, but it’s so
good, you’ll want to make a meal out of it. Vegan wanton wrappers are hard to
find, but it’s not hard to make your own. They’re not pristine and perfect like
the store-bought ones, but you won’t care when the nori recalls the sea to your
taste buds and the horseradish makes you glad you were born.

For the Wanton Wrappers:

½ cup all-purpose flour

Pinch of salt

2 TBLSP hot water (not boiling)

For the Filling:

1 TBLSP canola oil, more for frying

1 garlic clove, minced

2 green onions, chopped

5 fresh shiitake mushrooms (or any other kind you
like—oyster would be particularly good)

Slosh of tahini or soy sauce

4 TBLSP vegan cream cheese

For Assembly:

For Assembly:

1 nori sheet, cut into 2-inch squared

For the Sauce:

1 TBLSP Dijon-style mustard

2 teaspoons freshly grated horseradish

Make the Wanton
Wrappers:

Combine the flour and salt in a small bowl (a cereal bowl
will do) and add in the water. Knead it until it’s a supple dough, a little bit
shiny and fairly sticky. You may have to add pinches of flour or dribbles of
water to get it right.

Roll the lovely dough into a ball, dust it with flour, and
wrap with plastic wrap. Let it sit in a quiet corner meditating for about half
an hour. (Not in the refrigerator.)

When its time has come, unwrap the dough and plop it onto a
lightly floured surface. I like to cover my counter in waxed paper because it
makes cleanup easier, but you flour whatever surface appeals to you.

Knead the dough for about 2 minutes. It will seem springier
than it did before its rest and have a quiet sheen to it.

Roll the dough into a log about 1-inch thick and slice the
log into 1-inch segments. I get 6 or 8, depending on my mood.

Flatten the pieces of dough into little rounds with your fingers,
and then hit ‘em with the rolling pin to make them very thin and about 3-inches
in diameter. Mine aren’t exactly round and it still works out just fine.

Another
method is to roll out one big sheet and then cut it into 3-inch squares, and
fold the little darlings into triangles over the filling. This way gets a less
tender wanton, but it’s still pretty darn good.

If you’re not using them right away, wrap the circles (or
squares) individually in plastic wrap and then let them enjoy the quiet and darkness
of the refrigerator. They’ll keep about a week, so it’s definitely something
you can do the night before.

Make the Filling:

In a small skillet, heat the TBLSP of canola oil over medium
heat. Add the garlic and onions and sauté them for 45 seconds or so, until they
start to smell fabulous.

Add in the mushrooms and cook, stirring merrily, until
they’re tender.

Add the tahini or soy sauce and remove from the heat.

Add in the cream cheese and combine until thoroughly mixed.
The heat will melt the cheese a bit.

Set aside until it’s completely cooled.

Make the Sauce:

In a small bowl, vigorously stir the mustard and
horseradish.

I made a second sauce (equal parts—about 1 TBLSP each—of
tahini, mirin, rice vinegar, and miso, tossed in a little garlic powder and
whisked until smooth), which is my go-to dipping sauce, but it was too bland
for these little minxes. You’ll want the fire of the horseradish, so I didn’t
include the recipe for the second sauce in the ingredients section.

Assemble the
Rangoons:

In a large skillet, heat about ¼-inch of canola oil over
high or medium-high heat.

Peel one of the wrappers up from its little plastic wrap so
you know that it’s inclined to roam freely, and then set it down again. You
might try stretching it a bit while it’s up in the air, just enough to get it
roundish and about 3 inches. I tried loading them up in my hand, but the heat
of my hands made the dough stick and we had to have a serious conversation
about cooperating. So put the wrappers down again.

In the center of your wrapper, place a square of nori. In
the center of the nori, place a blop, maybe a scant teaspoon, of the filling.

Wet your finger (I put a little bowl of water there to
prevent wasting water or getting glop all over my faucet), and trace the circumference
of the wrapper with your wet finger.

Fold the little darling into a semi-circle (or triangle), pinching or
folding the edges together. The water will help. Try to avoid the filling
pushing its way out. It will be petulant and try, but you’re in charge here. The
nori will fold in half on the inside and make a sturdy spine for the little thing, if you do it right.

Repeat with the rest of the wrappers and filling.

Fry the assembled rangoons in the hot oil, turning them over
when the first side is golden.

Let the finished rangoons rest in splendor on a paper towel
and then serve immediately with the prepared sauce.

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About Me

I've been a vegetarian in some form or other since I was a teenager. I never liked meat (especially red meat), and I won the battle with my mother when I was 17. Now, back then, you have to realize, it was hard to get tofu or other non-animal proteins in a regular grocery store, so although my general health improved (I stopped getting colds and flus, and I gained enough weight to stop looking like a holocaust survivor), I started having digestive problems.

Western doctors knew even less about nutrition than they know now, Mine suggested that I eat chicken or fish about twice a month to keep my body's own enzymes and acids to a decent level, and then stress wouldn't send me into such a miserable zoo of pain. So I did it. It worked pretty well for quite a while. But in 2006, I went vegan, now that it's easy enough to get non-animal proteins.

Now I'm starting a third blog, on vegan cooking for one (or two). It started with coming home from rehearsal and wanting just one cookie. But then it got fun--what else could I make that didn't involve leftovers, or, in the case of baked goods, guilt for eating the whole batch. And I thought I'd share this collection of recipes that I've accumulated.